"Brethren, don't you hear the sound?The martial trumpet now is blowing;Men in order listing round,And soldiers to the standard flowing."
"Brethren, don't you hear the sound?The martial trumpet now is blowing;Men in order listing round,And soldiers to the standard flowing."
"Brethren, don't you hear the sound?The martial trumpet now is blowing;Men in order listing round,And soldiers to the standard flowing."
"Brethren, don't you hear the sound?
The martial trumpet now is blowing;
Men in order listing round,
And soldiers to the standard flowing."
There was a wild, exultant fulness of liberty that rolled in the note; and, to Harry's excited ear, there seemed in it a fierce challenge of contempt to his imbecility, and his soul at that moment seemed to be rent asunder with a pang such as only those can know who have felt what it is to be a slave. There was an uprising within him, vague, tumultuous, overpowering; diminstincts, heroic aspirations; the will to do, the soul to dare; and then, in a moment, there followed the picture of all society leagued against him, the hopeless impossibility of any outlet to what was burning within him. The waters of a nature naturally rally noble, pent up, and without outlet, rolled back upon his heart with a suffocating force: and, in his hasty anguish, he cursed the day of his birth. The spasm of his emotion was interrupted by the sudden appearance of Milly coming along the path.
"Why, bless you, Milly," said Harry in sudden surprise, "where are you going?"
"Oh, bless you, honey, chile. I's gwine on to take de stage. Dey wanted to get up de wagon for me; but, bless you, says I, what you s'pose de Lord gin us legs for? I never wants no critturs to tug me round, when I can walk myself. And, den, honey, it's so pleasant like, to be a walking along in de bush here, in de morning; 'pears like de voice of de Lord is walking among de trees. But, bless you, chile, honey, what's de matter o' yer face?"
"It's Tom Gordon, d—n him!" said Harry.
'Don't talk dat ar way, chile!' said Milly; using the freedom with Harry which her years and weight of character had gradually secured for her among the members of the plantation.
"Iwilltalk that way! Why shouldn't I? I am not going to be good any longer."
"Why, 'twon't help de matter to bebad, will it, Harry? 'Cause you hate Tom Gordon, does you want to act just like him?"
"No!" said Harry, "I won't be like him, but I'll have my revenge! Old Dred has been talking to me again, this morning. He always did stir me up so that I could hardly live; and I won't stand it any longer!"
"Chile," said Milly, "you take care! Keep clear on him! He's in de wilderness of Sinai; he is with de blackness, and darkness, and tempest. He han't come to de heavenly Jerusalem. Oh! Oh! honey! dere's a blood of sprinkling dat speaketh better things dan dat of Abel. Jerusalem above isfree—isfree, honey; so, don't you mind, now, what happens indisyer time."
"Ah, ah, Aunt Milly! this may do well enough for old womenlike you; but, stand opposite to a young fellow like me, with good strong arms, and a pair of doubled fists, and a body and soul just as full of light as they can be; it don't answer to go to telling about a heavenly Jerusalem! We want something here. We'll have it too! How do you know there is any heaven, anyhow?"
"Know it?" said Milly, her eye kindling, and striking her staff on the ground. "Know it? I knows it by dehankering arter itI got in here;" giving her broad chest a blow which made it resound like a barrel. "De Lord knowed what he was 'bout when he made us. When he made babies rooting round, with der poor little mouths open, he made milk, and de mammies for 'em too. Chile, we's nothing but great babies, but an't got our eyes opened—rooting round and round; but de Father'll feed us yet—he will so."
"He's a long time about it," said Harry, sullenly.
"Well, chile, an't it a long time 'fore your corn sprouts—a long time 'fore it gets into de ears?—but you plants for all dat. What's dat to me what I is here?—Shan't I reign with de Lord Jesus?"
"I don't know," said Harry.
"Well, honey,I does! Jest so sure as I's standing on dis yer ground. I knows in a few years I shall be reigning with de Lord Jesus, and a casting my crown at his feet. Dat's what I knows. Flesh and blood didn't reveal it unto me, but de Spirit of de Father. It's no odds to me what I does here; every road leads straight to glory, and de glory an't got no end to it!" And Milly uplifted her voice in a favorite stave—
"When we've been dere ten thousand years,Bright shining like de sun,We've no less days to sing God's praiseThan when we first begun."
"When we've been dere ten thousand years,Bright shining like de sun,We've no less days to sing God's praiseThan when we first begun."
"When we've been dere ten thousand years,Bright shining like de sun,We've no less days to sing God's praiseThan when we first begun."
"When we've been dere ten thousand years,
Bright shining like de sun,
We've no less days to sing God's praise
Than when we first begun."
"Chile," said she to him, solemnly, "I an't a fool. Does ye s'pose dat I thinks folks has any business to be sitting on der cheers all der life long, and working me, and living on my money? Why, I knows dey han't! An't it all wrong, from fust to last, de way dey makes merchandise o' us! Why, I know it is; but I's still about it, for de Lord's sake. I don't work for Miss Loo; I works for de Lord Jesus; and he is good pay—no mistake, now I tell you."
"Well," said Harry, a little shaken, but not convinced, "after all, there isn't much use in trying to do any other way. But you're lucky in feeling so, Aunt Milly; but I can't."
"Well, chile, any way, don't you do nothing rash, and don't you hearhim. Dat ar way out is through seas of blood. Why, chile, would you turn against Miss Nina? Chile, if they get a going, they won't spare nobody. Don't you start up dat ar tiger; 'cause, I tell ye, ye can't chain him, if ye do!"
"Yes," said Harry, "I see it's all madness, perfect madness; there's no use thinking, no use talking. Well, good-morning, Aunt Milly. Peace go with you!" And the young man started his horse, and was soon out of sight.
We owe our readers now some words of explanation respecting the new personage who has been introduced into our history; therefore we must go back somewhat, and allude to certain historical events of painful significance.
It has been a problem to many, how the system of slavery in America should unite the two apparent inconsistencies of a code of slave-laws more severe than that of any other civilized nation, with an average practice at least as indulgent as any other; for, bad as slavery is at the best, it may yet be admitted that the practice, as a whole, has been less cruel in this country than in many. An examination into history will show us that the cruelty of the laws resulted from the effects of indulgent practice. During the first years of importation of slaves into South Carolina, they enjoyed many privileges. Those who lived in intelligent families, and had any desire to learn, were instructed in reading and writing. Liberty was given them to meet in assemblies of worship, in class-meetings, and otherwise, without the presence of white witnesses; and many were raised to situations of trust and consequence. The result of this was the development of a good degree of intelligence and manliness among the slaves. There arose among them grave, thoughtful, energetic men, with their ears and eyes open, and their minds constantly awake to compare and reason.
When minds come into this state, in a government professing to be founded on principles of universal equality, it follows that almost every public speech, document, or newspaper, becomes an incendiary publication.
Of this fact the southern slave states have ever exhibited the most singular unconsciousness. Documents containing sentiments most dangerous for slaves to hear have been publicly read andapplauded among them. The slave has heard, amid shouts, on the Fourth of July, that his masters held the truth to be self-evident that all men were born equal, and had aninalienable rightto life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; and that all governments derive their just power from the consent of the governed. Even the mottoes of newspapers have embodied sentiments of the most insurrectionary character.
Such inscriptions as "Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God" stand, to this day, in large letters, at the head of southern newspapers; while speeches of senators and public men, in which the principles of universal democracy are asserted, are constant matters of discussion. Under such circumstances, it is difficult to induce the servant, who feels that he is a man, to draw those lines which seem so obvious to masters, by whom this fact has been forgotten. Accordingly we find that when the discussions for the admission of Missouri as a slave state produced a wave whose waters undulated in every part of the Union, there were found among the slaves men of unusual thought and vigor, who were no inattentive witnesses and listeners. The discussions were printed in the newspapers; and what was printed in the newspapers was further discussed at the post-office door, in the tavern, in the bar-room, at the dinner-party, where black servants were listening behind the chairs. A free colored man in the city of Charleston, named Denmark Vesey, was the one who had the hardihood to seek to use the electric fluid in the cloud thus accumulated. He conceived the hopeless project of imitating the example set by the American race, and achieving independence for the blacks.
Our knowledge of this man is derived entirely from the printed reports of the magistrates who gave an account of the insurrection, of which he was the instigator, and who will not, of course, be supposed to be unduly prejudiced in his favor. They state that he was first brought to the country by one Captain Vesey, a young lad, distinguished for personal beauty and great intelligence, and that he proved, for twenty years, a most faithful slave; but, on drawing a prize of fifteen hundred dollars in the lottery, he purchased his freedom of his master, and worked as a carpenter in the city of Charleston. He was distinguished for strength and activity, and, as the accounts state,maintained such an irreproachable character, and enjoyed so much the confidence of the whites, that when he was accused, the charge was not only discredited, but he was not even arrested for several days after, and not till the proof of his guilt had become too strong to be doubted. His historians go on, with considerablenaïveté, to remark:—
"It is difficult to conceivewhat motive he had to enter into such a plot, unless it was the one mentioned by one of the witnesses, who said that Vesey hadseveral children who were slaves, and that he said, on one occasion,he wished he could see them free, as he himself artfully remarked in his defence on his trial."
It appears that the project of rousing and animating the blacks to this enterprise occupied the mind of Vesey for more than four years, during which time he was continually taking opportunities to animate and inspire the spirits of his countrymen. The account states that the speeches in Congress of those opposed to the admission of Missouri into the Union, perhaps garbled and misrepresented, furnished him with ample means for inflaming the minds of the colored population.
"Even while walking in the street," the account goes on to say, "he was not idle; for, if his companion bowed to a white person, as slaves universally do, he would rebuke him, and observe, 'that all men were born equal, and that he was surprised that any one would degrade himself by such conduct; that he would never cringe to the whites nor ought any one to, who had the feelings of a man.'[1]When answered, 'We are slaves,' he would say, sarcastically and indignantly, 'You deserve to remain slaves!' And, if he were further asked, 'What can we do?' he would remark, 'Go and buy a spelling-book, and read the fable of "Hercules and the Wagoner."' He also sought every opportunity of entering into conversation with white persons, during which conversation he would artfully introduce some bold remark on slavery; and sometimes, when, from the character he was conversing with, he found he might be still bolder, he would go so far that, had not his declarations been clearly proved, they would scarcely have been credited."
But his great instrument of influence was a book that has always been prolific of insurrectionary movements, under all systems of despotism.
"He rendered himself perfectly familiar with all those parts of Scripture which he thought he could pervert to his purpose, and would readily quote them to prove that slavery was contrary to the laws of God, and that slaves were bound to attempt their emancipation, however shocking and bloody might be the consequences; that such efforts would not only be pleasing to the Almighty, but were absolutely enjoined."
Vesey, in the course of time, associated with himself five slavemen of marked character—Rolla, Ned, Peter, Monday, and Gullah Jack. Of these, the account goes on to say:—
"In the selection of his leaders, Vesey showed great penetration and sound judgment. Rolla was plausible, and possessed uncommon self-possession; bold and ardent, he was not to be deterred from his purpose by danger. Ned's appearance indicated that he was a man of firm nerves and desperate courage. Peter was intrepid and resolute, true to his engagements, and cautious in observing secrecy where it was necessary; he was not to be daunted nor impeded by difficulties, and, though confident of success, was careful in providing against any obstacles or casualties which might arise, and intent upon discovering every means which might be in their power, if thought of beforehand. Gullah Jack was regarded as a sorcerer, and, as such, feared by the natives of Africa, who believed in witchcraft. He was not only considered invulnerable, but that he could make others so by his charms, and that he could, and certainly would, provide all his followers with arms. He was artful, cruel, bloody; his disposition, in short, was diabolical. His influence among the Africans was inconceivable. Monday was firm, resolute, discreet, and intelligent."
"It is a melancholy truth that the general good conduct of all the leaders, except Gullah Jack, was such as rendered them objects least liable to suspicion. Their conduct had secured them, not only the unlimited confidence of their owners, but they had been indulged in every comfort, and allowed every privilege compatible with their situation in the community; and, though Gullah Jack was not remarkable for the correctness of his deportment, he by no means sustained a bad character. But," adds the report, "not only were the leaders of good character, and very much indulged by their owners, but this was verygenerally the case with all who were convicted, many of them possessing the highest confidence of their owners,and not one a bad character."
"The conduct and behavior of Vesey and his five leaders during their trial and imprisonment may be interesting to many. When Vesey was tried, he folded his arms, and seemed to pay great attention to the testimony given against him, but with his eyes fixed on the floor. In this situation he remained immovable until the witnesses had been examined by the court, and cross-examined by his counsel, when he requested to be allowed to examine the witnesses himself, which he did. The evidence being closed, he addressed the court at considerable length. When he received his sentence, tears trickled down his cheeks.
"Rolla, when arraigned, affected not to understand the charge against him; and when, at his request, it was explained to him, assumed, with wonderful adroitness, astonishment and surprise. He was remarkable throughout his trial for composure and great presence of mind. When he was informed that he was convicted, and was advised to prepare for death, he appeared perfectly confounded, but exhibited no signs of fear.
"In Ned's behavior there was nothing remarkable. His countenance was stern and immovable, even while he was receiving sentence of death. From his looks it was impossible to discover or conjecture what were his feelings. Not so with Peter Poyes. In his countenance were strongly marked disappointed ambition, revenge, indignation, and an anxiety to know how far the discoveries had extended. He did not appear to fear personal consequences, for his whole behavior indicated the reverse, but exhibited an evident anxiety for the success of their plan, in which his whole soul was embarked. His countenance and behavior were the same when he received his sentence, and his only words were, on retiring, 'I suppose you'll let me see my wife and family before I die,' and that in no supplicating tone. When he was asked, a day or two after, 'If it was possible that he could see his master and family murdered, who had treated him so kindly?' he replied to the question only by a smile. In their prison, the convicts resolutely refused to make any confessions or communications which might implicate others; and Peter Poyes sternly enjoined it upon them tomaintain this silence,—'Do not open your lips; die silent, as you will see me do!' and in this resolute silence they met their fate. Twenty-two of the conspirators were executed upon one gallows."
The account says, "That Peter Poyes was one of the most active of the recruiting agents. All the principal conspirators kept a list of those who had consented to join them, and Peter was said, by one of the witnesses, to have had six hundred names on his list; but, so resolutely to the last did he observe his pledge of secrecy to his associates, that, of the whole number arrested and tried, not one of them belonged to his company. In fact, in an insurrection in which thousands of persons were supposed to have been implicated, only thirty-six were convicted."
Among the children of Denmark Vesey was a boy by a Mandingo slave-woman, who was his father's particular favorite. The Mandingos are one of the finest of African tribes, distinguished for intelligence, beauty of form, and an indomitable pride and energy of nature. As slaves, they are considered particularly valuable by those who have tact enough to govern them, because of their great capability and their proud faithfulness; but they resent a government of brute force, and under such are always fractious and dangerous.
This boy received from his mother the name of Dred; a name not unusual among the slaves, and generally given to those of great physical force.
The development of this child's mind was so uncommon as to excite astonishment among the negroes. He early acquired the power of reading, by an apparent instinctive faculty, and would often astonish those around him with things which he had discovered in books. Like other children of a deep and fervent nature, he developed great religious ardor, and often surprised the older negroes by his questions and replies on this subject. A son so endowed could not but be an object of great pride and interest to a father like Denmark Vesey. The impression seemed to prevail universally among the negroes that this child was born for extraordinary things; and perhaps it was the yearning to acquire liberty for the development of such a mind which first led Denmark Vesey to reflect on the nature ofslavery, and the terrible weights which it lays on the human intellect, and to conceive the project of liberating a race.
The Bible, of which Vesey was an incessant reader, stimulated this desire. He likened his own position of comparative education, competence, and general esteem among the whites, to that of Moses among the Egyptians; and nourished the idea that, like Moses, he was sent as a deliverer. During the process of the conspiracy, this son, though but ten years of age, was his father's confidant; and he often charged him, though he should fail in the attempt, never to be discouraged. He impressed it upon his mind that he should never submit tamely to the yoke of slavery; and nourished the idea already impressed, that some more than ordinary destiny was reserved for him. After the discovery of the plot, and the execution of its leaders, those more immediately connected with them were sold from the state, even though not proved to have participated. With the most guarded caution, Vesey had exempted this son from suspicion. It had been an agreed policy with them both, that in the presence of others they should counterfeit alienation and dislike. Their confidential meetings with each other had been stolen and secret. At the time of his father's execution, Dred was a lad of fourteen. He could not be admitted to his father's prison, but he was a witness of the undaunted aspect with which he and the other conspirators met their doom. The memory dropped into the depths of his soul, as a stone drops into the desolate depths of a dark mountain lake.
Sold to a distant plantation, he became noted for his desperate, unsubduable disposition. He joined in none of the social recreations and amusements of the slaves, labored with proud and silent assiduity, but, on the slightest rebuke or threat, flashed up with a savage fierceness, which, supported by his immense bodily strength, made him an object of dread among overseers. He was one of those of whom they gladly rid themselves; and, like a fractious horse, was sold from master to master. Finally, an overseer, hardier than the rest, determined on the task of subduing him. In the scuffle that ensued Dred struck him to the earth, a dead man, made his escape to the swamps, and was never afterwards heard of in civilized life.
The reader who consults the map will discover that the wholeeastern shore of the southern states, with slight interruptions, is belted by an immense chain of swamps, regions of hopeless disorder, where the abundant growth and vegetation of nature, sucking up its forces from the humid soil, seems to rejoice in a savage exuberance, and bid defiance to all human efforts either to penetrate or subdue. These wild regions are the homes of the alligator, the moccasin, and the rattle-snake. Evergreen trees, mingling freely with the deciduous children of the forest, form here dense jungles, verdant all the year round, and which afford shelter to numberless birds, with whose warbling the leafy desolation perpetually resounds. Climbing vines, and parasitic plants, of untold splendor and boundless exuberance of growth, twine and interlace, and hang from the heights of the highest trees pennons of gold and purple,—triumphant banners, which attest the solitary majesty of nature. A species of parasitic moss wreaths its abundant draperies from tree to tree, and hangs in pearly festoons, through which shine the scarlet berry and green leaves of the American holly.
What the mountains of Switzerland were to the persecuted Vaudois, this swampy belt has been to the American slave. The constant effort to recover from thence fugitives has led to the adoption, in these states, of a separate profession, unknown at this time in any other Christian land—hunters, who train and keep dogs for the hunting of men, women, and children. And yet, with all the convenience of this profession, the reclaiming of the fugitives from these fastnesses of nature has been a work of such expense and difficulty, that the near proximity of the swamp has always been a considerable check on the otherwise absolute power of the overseer. Dred carried with him to the swamp but one solitary companion—the Bible of his father. To him it was not the messenger of peace and good-will, but the herald of woe and wrath!
As the mind, looking on the great volume of nature, sees there a reflection of its own internal passions, and seizes on that in it which sympathizes with itself,—as the fierce and savage soul delights in the roar of torrents, the thunder of avalanches, and the whirl of ocean-storms,—so is it in the great answering volume of revelation. There is something there for every phase of man's nature; and hence its endless vitality and stimulatingforce. Dred had heard read in the secret meetings of conspirators the wrathful denunciations of ancient prophets against oppression and injustice. He had read of kingdoms convulsed by plagues; of tempest, and pestilence, and locusts; of the sea cleft in twain, that an army of slaves might pass through, and of their pursuers whelmed in the returning waters. He had heard of prophets and deliverers, armed with supernatural powers, raised up for oppressed people; had pondered on the nail of Jael, the goad of Shamgar, the pitcher and lamp of Gideon; and thrilled with fierce joy as he read how Samson, with his two strong arms, pulled down the pillars of the festive temple, and whelmed his triumphant persecutors in one grave with himself.
In the vast solitudes which he daily traversed, these things entered deep into his soul. Cut off from all human companionship, often going weeks without seeing a human face, there was no recurrence of every-day and prosaic ideas to check the current of the enthusiasm thus kindled. Even in the soil of the cool Saxon heart the Bible has thrown out its roots with an all-pervading energy, so that the whole frame-work of society may be said to rest on soil held together by its fibres. Even in cold and misty England, armies have been made defiant and invincible by the incomparable force and deliberate valor which it breathes into men. But, when this oriental seed, an exotic among us, is planted back in the fiery soil of a tropical heart, it bursts forth with an incalculable ardor of growth.
A stranger cannot fail to remark the fact that, though the slaves of the south are unable to read the Bible for themselves, yet most completely have its language and sentiment penetrated among them, giving a Hebraistic coloring to their habitual mode of expression. How much greater, then, must have been the force of the solitary perusal of this volume on so impassioned a nature!—a nature, too, kindled by memories of the self-sacrificing ardor with which a father and his associates had met death at the call of freedom; for, none of us may deny that, wild and hopeless as this scheme was, it was still the same in kind with the more successful one which purchased for our fathers a national existence.
A mind of the most passionate energy and vehemence, thusawakened, for years made the wild solitudes of the swamp its home. That book, so full of startling symbols and vague images, had for him no interpreter but the silent courses of nature. His life passed in a kind of dream. Sometimes, traversing for weeks these desolate regions, he would compare himself to Elijah traversing for forty days and nights the solitudes of Horeb; or to John the Baptist in the wilderness, girding himself with camel's hair, and eating locusts and wild honey. Sometimes he would fast and pray for days; and then voices would seem to speak to him, and strange hieroglyphics would be written upon the leaves. In less elevated moods of mind, he would pursue, with great judgment and vigor, those enterprises necessary to preserve existence. The negroes lying out in the swamps are not so wholly cut off from society as might at first be imagined. The slaves of all the adjoining plantations, whatever they may pretend, to secure the good-will of their owners, are at heart secretly disposed, from motives both of compassion and policy, to favor the fugitives. They very readily perceive that, in the event of any difficulty occurring to themselves, it might be quite necessary to have a friend and protector in the swamp; and therefore they do not hesitate to supply these fugitives, so far as they are able, with anything which they may desire. The poor whites, also, who keep small shops in the neighborhood of plantations, are never particularly scrupulous, provided they can turn a penny to their own advantage; and willingly supply necessary wares in exchange for game, with which the swamp abounds.
Dred, therefore, came in possession of an excellent rifle, and never wanted for ammunition, which supplied him with an abundance of food. Besides this, there are here and there elevated spots in the swampy land, which, by judicious culture, are capable of great productiveness. And many such spots Dred had brought under cultivation, either with his own hands, or from those of other fugitives, whom he had received and protected. From the restlessness of his nature, he had not confined himself to any particular region, but had traversed the whole swampy belt of both the Carolinas, as well as that of Southern Virginia; residing a few months in one place, and a few months in another. Wherever he stopped, he formed a sort of retreat, where hereceived and harbored fugitives. On one occasion, he rescued a trembling and bleeding mulatto woman from the dogs of the hunters, who had pursued her into the swamp. This woman he made his wife, and appeared to entertain a very deep affection for her. He made a retreat for her, with more than common ingenuity, in the swamp adjoining the Gordon plantation; and, after that, he was more especially known in that locality. He had fixed his eye upon Harry, as a person whose ability, address, and strength of character, might make him at some day a leader in a conspiracy against the whites. Harry, in common with many of the slaves on the Gordon plantation, knew perfectly well of the presence of Dred in the neighborhood, and had often seen and conversed with him. But neither he nor any of the rest of them ever betrayed before any white person the slightest knowledge of the fact.
This ability of profound secrecy is one of the invariable attendants of a life of slavery. Harry was acute enough to know that his position was by no means so secure that he could afford to dispense with anything which might prove an assistance in some future emergency. The low white traders in the neighborhood also knew Dred well; but, as long as they could drive an advantageous trade with him, he was secure from their intervention. So secure had he been, that he had been even known to mingle in the motley throng of a camp-meeting unmolested. Thus much with regard to one who is to appear often on the stage before our history is done.
FOOTNOTE:[1]These extracts are taken from the official report.
[1]These extracts are taken from the official report.
[1]These extracts are taken from the official report.
In the course of a few days the family circle at Canema was enlarged by the arrival of Clayton's sister; and Carson, in excellent spirits, had started for a Northern watering-place. In answer to Nina's letter of invitation, Anne had come with her father, who was called to that vicinity by the duties of his profession. Nina received her with her usual gay frankness of manner; and Anne, like many others, soon found herself liking her future sister much better than she had expected. Perhaps, had Nina been in any other situation than that of hostess, her pride might have led her to decline making the agreeable to Anne, whom, notwithstanding, she very much wished to please. But she was mistress of the mansion, and had an Arab's idea of the privileges of a guest; and so she chatted, sang, and played for her; she took her about, showed her the walks, the arbors, the flower-garden; waited on her in her own apartment, with a thousand little attentions, all the more fascinating from the kind of careless independence with which they were rendered. Besides, Nina had vowed a wicked little vow in her heart that she would ride rough-shod over Anne's dignity; that she wouldn't let her be grave or sensible, but that she should laugh and frolic with her. And Clayton could scarce help smiling at the success that soon crowned her exertions. Nina's gayety, when in full tide, had a breezy infectiousness in it, that seemed to stir up every one about her and carry them on the tide of her own spirits; and Anne, in her company, soon found herself laughing at everything and nothing, simply because she felt gay.
To crown all, Uncle John Gordon arrived, with his cheery, jovial face; and he was one of those fearless, hit-or-miss talkers, that are invaluable in social dilemmas, because they keep something or other all the while in motion.
With him came Madam Gordon, or, as Nina commonly called her, Aunt Maria. She was a portly, finely-formed, middle-aged woman, who might have been handsome, had not the lines of care and nervous anxiety ploughed themselves so deeply in her face. Her bright, keen, hazel eyes, fine teeth, and the breadth of her ample form, attested the vitality of the old Virginia stock from whence she sprung.
"There," said Nina, to Anne Clayton, as they sat in the shady side of the veranda, "I've marshalled Aunt Maria up into Aunt Nesbit's room, and there they will have a comfortable dish of lamentation over me."
"Over you?" said Anne.
"Yes—over me, to be sure!—that's the usual order of exercises. Such a setting down as I shall get! They'll count up on their fingers all the things I ought to know and don't, and ought to do and can't. I believe that's the way relatives always show their affection—aunts in particular—by mourning over you."
"And what sort of a list will they make out?" said Anne.
"Oh, bless me, that's easy enough. Why, there's Aunt Maria is a perfectly virulent housekeeper—really insane, I believe, on that subject. Why, she chases up every rat and mouse and cockroach, every particle of dust, every scrap of litter. She divides her hours, and is as punctual as a clock. She rules her household with a rod of iron, and makes everybody stand round; and tells each one how many times a day they may wink. She keeps accounts like a very dragon, and always is sure to pounce on anybody that is in the least out of the way. She cuts out clothes by the bale; she sews, and she knits, and she jingles keys. And all this kind of bustle she calls housekeeping! Now, what do you suppose she must think of me, who just put on my hat in the morning, and go sailing down the walks, looking at the flowers, till Aunt Katy calls me back, to know what my orders are for the day?"
"Pray, who is Aunt Katy?" said Anne.
"Oh, she is my female prime minister; and she is very much like some prime ministers I have studied about in history, who always contrive to have their own way, let what will come. Now, when Aunt Katy comes and wants to know, sorespectfully, 'What Miss Nina is going to have for dinner,' do you suppose she has the least expectation of getting anything that I order? She always has fifty objections to anything that I propose. For sometimes the fit comes over me to try to behouse-keepy, like Aunt Maria; but it's no go, I can tell you. So, when she has proved that everything that I propose is the height of absurdity, and shown conclusively that there's nothing fit to be eaten in the neighborhood, by that time I am reduced to a proper state of mind. And, when I humbly say, 'Aunt Katy, whatshallwe do?' then she gives a little cough, and out comes the whole programme, just as she had arranged it the night before. And so it goes. As to accounts, why Harry has to look after them. I detest everything about money, except the spending of it—I have rather a talent for that. Now, just think how awfully all this must impress poor Aunt Maria! What sighings, and rollings up of eyes, and shakings of heads, there are over me! And, then, Aunt Nesbit is always dinging at me about improving my mind! And improving my mind means reading some horrid, stupid, boring old book, just as she does! Now, I like the idea of improving my mind. I am sure it wants improving, bad enough; but, then, I can't help thinking that racing through the garden, and cantering through the woods, improves it faster than getting asleep over books. It seems to me that books are just like dry hay—very good when there isn't any fresh grass to be had. But I'd rather be out and eat what's growing. Now, what people call nature never bores me; but almost every book I ever saw does. Don't you think people are made differently? Some like books, and some like things; don't you think so?"
"I can give you a good fact on your side of the argument," said Clayton, who had come up behind them during the conversation.
"I didn't know I was arguing; but I shall be glad to have anything on my side," said Nina, "of course."
"Well, then," said Clayton, "I'll say that the books that have influenced the world the longest, the widest, and deepest, have been written by men who attended tothingsmore than to books; who, as you say, eat what was growing, instead of dry hay. Homer couldn't have had much to read in his time, northe poets of the Bible; and they have been fountains for all ages. I don't believe Shakespeare was much of a reader."
"Well, but," said Anne, "don't you think that, for us common folks, who are not going to be either Homers or Shakespeares, that it's best to have two strings to our bow, and to gain instruction both from books and things?"
"To be sure," said Clayton, "if we only use books aright. With many people, reading is only a form of mental indolence, by which they escape the labor of thinking for themselves. Some persons are like Pharaoh's lean kine; they swallow book upon book, but remain as lean as ever."
"My grandfather used to say," said Anne, "that the Bible and Shakespeare were enough for a woman's library."
"Well," said Nina, "I don't like Shakespeare, there! I'm coming out flat with it. In the first place, I don't understand half he says; and, then, they talk about his being so very natural! I'm sure I never heard people talk as he makes them. Now, did you ever hear people talk in blank verse, with every now and then one or two lines of rhyme, as his characters do when they go off in long speeches? Now, did you?"
"As to that," said Clayton, "it's about half and half. His conversations have just about the same resemblance to real life that acting at the opera has. It is not natural for Norma to burst into a song when she discovers the treachery of her husband. You make that concession to the nature of the opera, in the first place; and then, with that reserve, all the rest strikes you as natural, and the music gives an added charm to it. So in Shakespeare, you concede that the plays are to be poems, and that the people are to talk in rhythm, and with all the exaltation of poetic sentiment; and, that being admitted, their conversations may seem natural."
"But I can'tunderstanda great deal that Shakespeare says," said Nina.
"Because so many words and usages are altered since he wrote," said Clayton. "Because there are so many allusions to incidents that have passed, and customs that have perished, that you have, as it were, to acquire his language before you can understand him. Suppose a poem were written in a foreign tongue; you couldn't say whether you liked it or disliked it tillyou could read the language. Now, my opinion is, that there is a liking for Shakespeare hidden in your nature, like a seed that has not sprouted."
"What makes you think so?"
"Oh, I see it in you, just as a sculptor sees a statue in a block of marble."
"And are you going to chisel it out?" said Nina.
"With your leave," said Clayton. "After all, I like your sincerity in saying what you do think. I have often heard ladies profess an admiration for Shakespeare that I knew couldn't be real. I knew that they had neither the experience of life, nor the insight into human nature, really to appreciate what is in him; and that their liking for him was all a worked-up affair, because they felt it would be very shocking not to like him."
"Well," said Nina, "I'm much obliged to you for all the sense you find in my nonsense. I believe I shall keep you to translate my fooleries into good English."
"You know I'm quite at your disposal," said Clayton, "for that or anything else."
At this moment the attention of Nina was attracted by loud exclamations from that side of the house where the negro cottages were situated.
"Get along off! don't want none o' yo old trash here! No, no, Miss Nina don't want none o' yo old fish! She's got plenty of niggers to ketch her own fish."
"Somebody taking my name in vain in those regions," said Nina, running to the other end of the veranda. "Tomtit," she said to that young worthy, who lay flat on his back, kicking up his heels in the sun, waiting for his knives to clean themselves, "pray tell me what's going on there!"
"Laws, missis," said Tom, "it's just one of dese yer poor white trash, coming round here trying to sell one thing o' nother. Miss Loo says it won't do 'courage 'em, and I's de same 'pinion."
"Send him round here to me," said Nina, who, partly from humanity, and partly from a spirit of contradiction, had determined to take up for the poor white folks, on all occasions. Tomtit ran accordingly, and soon brought to the veranda a man whose wretchedly tattered clothing scarcely formed a decentcovering. His cheeks were sunken and hollow, and he stood before Nina with a cringing, half-ashamed attitude; and yet one might see that, with better dress and better keeping, he might be made to assume the appearance of a handsome, intelligent man. "What do you ask for your fish?" she said to him.
"Anything ye pleases!"
"Where do you live?" said Nina, drawing out her purse.
"My folks's staying on Mr. Gordon's place."
"Why don't you get a place of your own to stay on?" said Nina.
There was an impatient glance flashed from the man's eye, but it gave place immediately to his habitual cowed expression, as he said,—
"Can't get work—can't get money—can't get nothing."
"Dear me," said her Uncle John, who had been standing for a moment listening to the conversation. "This must be husband of that poor hobgoblin that has lighted down on my place lately. Well, you may as well pay him a good price for his fish. Keep them from starving one day longer, may be." And Nina paid the man a liberal sum, and dismissed him.
"I suppose, now, all my eloquence wouldn't make Rose cook those fish for dinner," said Nina.
"Why not, if you told her to?" said Aunt Maria, who had also descended to the veranda.
"Why not?—Just because, as she would say, she hadn'tlaid outto do it."
"That's not the waymyservants are taught to do!" said Aunt Maria.
"I'll warrant not," said Nina. "But yours and mine are quite different affairs, aunt. They all do as they have a mind to, in my 'diggings.' All I stipulated for is a little of the same privilege."
"That man's wife and children have come and 'squatted' down on my place," said Mr. Gordon, laughing; "and so, Nin, all you paid for his fish is just so much saving to me."
"Yes, to be sure! Mr. Gordon is just one of those men that will have a tribe of shiftless hangers on at his heels!" said Mrs. Gordon.
"Well, bless my soul! what's a fellow to do? Can't see thepoor heathen starve, can we? If society could only be organized over, now, there would be hope for them. The brain ought to control the hands; but among us the hands try to set up for themselves;—and see what comes of it!"
"Who do you mean by brain?" said Nina.
"Who?—Why,weupper crust, to be sure! We educated people! We ought to have an absolute sway over the working classes, just as the brain rules the hand. It must come to that, at last—no other arrangement is possible. The white working classes can't take care of themselves, and must be put into a condition for us to take care of them. What is liberty to them?—Only a name—liberty to be hungry and naked, that's all. It's the strangest thing in the world, how people stick to names! I suppose that fellow, up there, would flare up terribly at being put in with my niggers; and yet he and his children are glad of the crumbs that fall from their table! It's astonishing to me how, with such examples before them, any decent man can be so stone blind as to run a tilt against slavery. Just compare the free working classes with our slaves! Dear me! the blindness of people in this world! It's too much for my patience, particularly in hot weather!" said Mr. John, wiping his face with a white pocket-handkerchief.
"Well, but, Uncle John," said Nina, "my dear old gentleman, you haven't travelled, as I have."
"No, child! I thank the Lord I never stepped my foot out of a slave state, and I never mean to," said Uncle John.
"But you ought to see thenorthernworking people," said Nina. "Why, the Governors of the States are farmers, sometimes, and work with their own men. The brain and the hand go together, in each one—not one great brain to fifty pair of hands. And, I tell you, work isdoneup there very differently from what's done here! Just look at our ploughs and our hoes!—the most ridiculous things that I ever saw. I should think one of them would weigh ten pounds!"
"Well, if you don't have 'em heavy enough to go into the ground by their own weight, these cussed lazy nigs won't do anything with them. They'd break a dozen Yankee hoes in a forenoon," said Uncle John.
"Now," said Nina, "Uncle John, you dear old heathen, you!do let me tell you a little how it is there. I went up into New Hampshire, once, with Livy Ray, to spend a vacation. Livy's father is a farmer; works part of every day with his own men; hoes, digs, plants; but he is Governor of the State. He has a splendid farm—all in first-rate order; and his sons, with two or three hired men, keep it in better condition than our places ever saw. Mr. Ray is a man who reads a great deal; has a fine library, and he's as much of a gentleman as you'll often see. There are no high and lowclassesthere. Everybody works; and everybody seems to have a good time. Livy's mother has a beautiful dairy, spring house, and two strong women to help her; and everything in the house looks beautifully; and, for the greater part of the day, the house seems so neat and still, you wouldn't know anything had been done in it. Seems to me this is better than making slaves of all the working classes, or having any working classes at all."
"How wise young ladies always are!" said Uncle John. "Undoubtedly the millennium is begun in New Hampshire! But, pray, my dear, what part doyoungladies take in all this? Seems to me, Nin,youhaven't picked up much of this improvement in person."
"Oh, as to that, I labor in my vocation," said Nina; "that is, of enlightening dull, sleepy old gentlemen, who never travelled out of the state they were born in, and don't know what can be done. I come as a missionary to them; I'm sure that's work enough for one."
"Well," said Aunt Maria, "I know I am as great a slave as any of the poor whites, or negroes either. There isn't a soul in my whole troop that pretends to take any care, except me, either about themselves or their children, or anything else."
"I hope that isn't a slant at me!" said Uncle John, shrugging his shoulders.
"I must say you are as bad as any of them," said Aunt Maria.
"There it goes!—now, I'm getting it!" said Uncle John. "I declare, the next time we get a preacher out here, I'm going to make him hold forth on the duties of wives!"
"And husbands, too!" said Aunt Maria.
"Do," said Nina; "I should like a little prospective information."
Nina, as often, spoke before she thought. Uncle John gave a malicious look at Clayton. Nina could not recall the words. She colored deeply, and went on hastily to change the subject.
"At any rate, I know that aunt, here, has a much harder time than housekeepers do in the free states. Just the shoes she wears out chasing up her negroes would hire help enough to do all her work. They used to have an idea up there, that all the southern ladies did was to lie on the sofa. I used to tell them it was as much as they knew about it."
"Yourcares don't seem to have worn you much!" said Uncle John.
"Well, they will, Uncle John, if you don't behave better. It's enough to break anybody down to keep you in order."
"I wish," said Uncle John, shrugging up his shoulders, and looking quizzically at Clayton, "somebody would take warning!"
"For my part," said Aunt Maria, "I know one thing: I'd be glad to get rid of my negroes. Sometimes I think life is such a burden that I don't think it's worth having."
"Oh, no, you don't, mother!" said Uncle John; "not with such a charming husband as you've got, who relieves you from all care so perfectly!"
"I declare," said Nina, looking along the avenue, "what's that? Why, if there isn't old Tiff, coming along with his children!"
"Who is he?" said Aunt Maria.
"Oh, he belongs to one of these miserable families," said Aunt Nesbit, "that have squatted in the pine-woods somewhere about here—a poor, worthless set! but Nina has a great idea of patronizing them."
"Clear Gordon, every inch of her!" said Aunt Maria, as Nina ran down to meet Tiff. "Just like her uncle!"
"Come, now, old lady, I'll tell ofyou, if you don't take care!" said Mr. Gordon. "Didn't I find you putting up a basket of provisions for those folks you scolded me so for taking in?"
"Scold, Mr. Gordon? I never scold!"
"I beg pardon—that you reproved me for!"
Ladies generally are not displeased for being reproached for their charities; and Aunt Maria, whose bark, to use a vulgarproverb, was infinitely worse than her bite, sat fanning herself, with an air of self-complacency. Meanwhile, Nina had run down the avenue, and was busy in a confidential communication with Tiff. On her return, she came skipping up the steps, apparently in high glee.
"Oh, Uncle John! there's the greatest fun getting up! You must all go, certainly! What do you think? Tiff says there's to be a camp-meeting in the neighborhood, only about five miles off from his place. Let's make up a party, and all go!"
"That's the time of day!" said Uncle John. "I enrol myself under your banner, at once. I am open to improvement! Anybody wants to convert me, here I am!"
"The trouble with you, Uncle John," said Nina, "is that you don'tstayconverted. You are just like one of these heavy fishes—you bite very sharp, but, before anybody can get you fairly on to the bank, you are flapping and floundering back into the water, and down you go into your sins again. I know at least three ministers who thought they had hooked you out; but they were mistaken."
"For my part," said Aunt Maria, "I think these camp-meetings do more harm than good. They collect all the scum and the riff-raff of the community, and I believe there's more drinking done at camp-meetings in one week than is done in six anywhere else. Then, of course, all the hands will want to be off; and Mr. Gordon has brought them up so that they feel dreadfully abused if they are not in with everything that's going on. I shall set downmyfoot, this year, that they shan't go any day except Sunday."
"My wife knows that she was always celebrated for having the handsomest foot in the country, and so she is always setting it down atme!" said Mr. Gordon; "for she knows that a pretty foot is irresistible with me."
"Mr. Gordon, how can you talk so? I should think that you'd got old enough not to make such silly speeches!" said Aunt Maria.
"Silly speeches! It's a solemn fact, and you won't hear anything truer at the camp-meeting!" said Uncle John. "But come, Clayton, will you go? My dear fellow, your grave face will be an appropriate ornament to the scene, I can assure you;and, as to Miss Anne, it won't do for an old fellow like me, in this presence, to say what a happiness it would be."
"I suspect," said Anne, "Edward is afraid he may be called on for some of the services. People are always taking him for a clergyman, and asking him to say grace at meals, and to conduct family prayers, when he is travelling among strangers."
"It's a comment on our religion, that these should be thought peculiar offices of clergymen," said Clayton. "Every Christian man ought to be ready and willing to take them."
"I honor that sentiment!" said Uncle John. "A man ought not so be ashamed of his religion anywhere, no more than a soldier of his colors. I believe there's more religion hid in the hearts of honest laymen, now, than is plastered up behind the white cravats of clergymen; and they ought to come out with it. Not that I have any disrespect for the clergy, either," said Uncle John. "Fine men—a little stiffish, and don't call things by good English names. Always talking about dispensation, and sanctification, and edification, and so forth; but I like them. They are sincere. I suppose they wouldn't any of them give me a chance for heaven, because I rip out with an oath, every now and then. But, the fact is, what with niggers, and overseers, and white trash, my chances of salvation are dreadfully limited. I can't help swearing, now and then, if I was to die for it. They say it's dreadfully wicked; but I feel more Christian when I let out than when I keep in!"
"Mr. Gordon," said Aunt Maria, reprovingly, "do consider what you're saying!"
"My dear, Iamconsidering. I am considering all the time! I never do anything else but consider—except, as I said before, every now and then, when what-'s-his-name gets the advantage over me. And, hark you, Mrs. G., let's have things ready at our house, if any of the clergy would like to spend a week or so with us; and we could get them up some meetings, or any little thing in their line. I always like to show respect for them."
"Our beds arealwaysprepared for company, Mr. Gordon," said Aunt Maria, with a stately air.
"Oh, yes, yes, I don't doubt that! I only meant some special preparation—some little fatted-calf killing, and so on."
"Now," said Nina, "shall we set off to-morrow morning?"
"Agreed!" said Uncle John.
The announcement of the expected camp-meeting produced a vast sensation at Canema, in other circles beside the hall. In the servants' department, everybody was full of the matter, from Aunt Katy down to Tomtit. The women were thinking over their available finery; for these gatherings furnish the negroes with the same opportunity of display that Grace Church does to the Broadway belles. And so, before Old Tiff, who had brought the first intelligence to the plantation, had time to depart, Tomtit had trumpeted the news through all the cluster of negro-houses that skirted the right side of the mansion, proclaiming that "dere was gwine to be a camp-meeting, and tip-top work of grace, and Miss Nina was going to let all de niggers go." Old Tiff, therefore, found himself in a prominent position in a group of negro-women, among whom Rose, the cook, was conspicuous.
"Law, Tiff, ye gwine? and gwine to take your chil'en? ha! ha! ha!" said she. "Why, Miss Fanny, dey'll tink Tiff's yer mammy! Ho! ho! ho!"
"Yah! yah! Ho! ho! ho!" roared in a chorus of laughter on all sides, doing honor to Aunt Rosy's wit; and Tomtit, who hung upon the skirts of the crowd, threw up the fragment of a hat in the air, and kicked it in an abandon of joy, regardless of the neglected dinner-knives. Old Tiff, mindful of dignities, never failed to propitiate Rose, on his advents to the plantation, with the gift which the "wise man saith maketh friends;" and, on the present occasion he had enriched her own peculiar stock of domestic fowl by the present of a pair of young partridge-chicks, a nest of which he had just captured, intending to bring them up by hand, as he did his children. By this discreet course, Tiff stood high where it was of most vital consequence that he should so stand; and many a choice morsel did Rosecook for him in secret, besides imparting to him most invaluable recipes on the culture and raising of sucking babies. Old Hundred, like many other persons, felt that general attention lavished on any other celebrity was so much taken from his own merits, and, therefore, on the present occasion, sat regarding Tiff's evident popularity with a cynical eye. At last, coming up, like a wicked fellow as he was, he launched his javelin at Old Tiff, by observing to his wife,—
"I's 'stonished at you, Rose!You, cook to de Gordons, and making youself so cheap—so familiar with de poor white folks' niggers!"
Had the slant fallen upon himself, personally, Old Tiff would probably have given a jolly crow, and laughed as heartily as he generally did if he happened to be caught out in a rain-storm; but the reflection on his family connection fired him up like a torch, and his eyes flashed through his big spectacles like firelight through windows.
"You go 'long, talking 'bout what you don' know nothing 'bout! I like to know what you knows 'bout de old Virginny fam'lies?Dem'sde real old stock! You Car'lina folks come fromdem, stick and stock, every blest one of you! De Gordons is a nice family—an't nothing to say agin de Gordons—but whar was you raised, dat ye didn't hear 'bout de Peytons? Why, old Gen'al Peyton, didn't he use to ride with six black horses afore him, as if he'd been a king? Dere wan't one of dem horses dat hadn't a tail as long as my arm.Younever see no such critters inyourlife!"
"I han't, han't I?" said Old Hundred, now, in his turn, touched in a vital point. "Bless me, if I han't seen de Gordons riding out with der eight horses, any time o' day!"
"Come, come, now, dere wasn't so many!" said Rose, who had her own reasons for staying on Tiff's side. "Nobody never rode with eight horses!"
"Did too! You say much more, I'll make sixteen on 'em! 'Fore my blessed master, how dese yer old niggers will lie! Dey's always zaggerating der families. Makes de very har rise on my head, to hear dese yer old niggers talk, dey lie so!" said Old Hundred.
"You tink folks dat take to lying is using up your business,don't ye?" said Tiff. "But, I tell you, any one dat says a word agin de Peytons got me to set in with!"
"Laws, dem chil'en an't Peytons!" said Old Hundred; "dey's Crippses; and I like to know who ever hearn of de Crippses? Go way! don't tell me nothing about dem Crippses! Dey's poor white folks! A body may seedatsticking out all over 'em!"
"You shut up!" said Tiff. "I don't b'lieve you was born on de Gordon place, 'cause you an't got no manners. I spects you some old, second-hand nigger, Colonel Gordon must a took for debt, some time, from some of dese yer mean Tennessee families, dat don' know how to keep der money when dey gets it. Der niggers is allers de meanest kind. 'Cause all de real Gordon niggers is ladies and gen'lemen—every one of 'em!" said Old Tiff, like a true orator, bent on carrying his audience along with him.
A general shout chorused this compliment; and Tiff, under cover of the applause, shook up his reins, and rode off in triumph.
"Dar, now, you aggravating old nigger," said Rose, turning to her bosom lord, "I hope yer got it now! De plaguest old nigger dat ever I see! And you, Tom, go 'long and clean your knives, if yer don't mean to be cracked over!"
Meanwhile Tiff, restored to his usual tranquillity, ambled along homeward behind his one-eyed horse, singing "I'm bound for the land of Canaan," with some surprising variations.
At last Miss Fanny, as he constantly called her, interposed with a very pregnant question.
"Uncle Tiff, where is the land of Canaan?"
"De Lord-a-mercy, chile, dat ar's what I'd like to know myself."
"Is it heaven?" said Fanny.
"Well, I reckon so," said Tiff, dubiously.
"Is it where ma is gone?" said Fanny.
"Chile, I reckon it is," said Tiff.
"Is it down under ground?" said Fanny.
"Why, no! ho! ho! honey!" said Tiff, laughing heartily. "What put dat ar in your head, Miss Fanny?"
"Didn't ma go that way?" said Fanny, "down through the ground?"
"Lordy, no, chile! Heaven's up!" said Tiff, pointing up to the intense blue sky which appeared through the fringy hollows of the pine-trees above them.
"Is there any stairs anywhere? or any ladder to get up by?" said Fanny. "Or do they walk to where the sky touches the ground, and get up? Perhaps they climb up on the rainbow."
"I don' know, chile, how dey works it," said Uncle Tiff. "Dey gets dar somehow. I's studdin' upon dat ar. I's gwine to camp-meeting to find out. I's been to plenty of dem ar, and I never could quite see clar. 'Pears like dey talks about everything else more'n dey does about dat. Dere's de Methodists, dey cuts up de Presbyter'ans; and de Presbyter'ans pitches into de Methodists; and den both on 'em's down on de 'Piscopals. My ole mist' was 'Piscopal, and I never seed no harm in't. And de Baptists think dey an't none on 'em right; and, while dey's all a blowing out at each other, dat ar way, I's a wondering whar's de way to Canaan. It takes a mighty heap o' larning to know about dese yer things, and I an't got no larning. I don' know nothing, only de Lord, he 'peared to your ma, and he knows de way, and he took her. But, now, chile, I's gwine to fix you up right smart, and take you, Teddy, and de baby, to dis yer camp-meeting, so you can seek de Lord in yer youth."
"Tiff, if you please, I'd rather not go!" said Fanny, in an apprehensive tone.
"Oh, bress de Lord, Miss Fanny, why not? Fust-rate times dere."
"There'll be too many people. I don't want them to see us."
The fact was, that Rose's slant speech about Tiff's maternal relationship, united with the sneers of Old Hundred, had their effect upon Fanny's mind. Naturally proud, and fearful of ridicule, she shrank from the public display which would thus be made of their family condition; yet she would not for the world have betrayed to her kind old friend the real reason of her hesitation. But Old Tiff's keen eye had noticed the expression of the child's countenance at the time. If anybody supposes that the faithful old creature's heart was at all wounded by the perception, they are greatly mistaken.
To Tiff it appeared a joke of the very richest quality; and, as he rode along in silence for some time, he indulged himself inone of his quiet, long laughs, actually shaking his old sides till the tears streamed down his cheeks.
"What's the matter with you, Tiff?" said Fanny.
"Oh, Miss Fanny, Tiff knows!—Tiff knows de reason ye don't want to go to camp-meeting. Tiff's seen it in yer face—ye ho! ho! ho! Miss Fanny, is you 'fraid dey'll take Old Tiff for yer mammy?—ye ho! ho! ho!—for yer mammy?—and Teddy's, and de baby's?—bless his little soul!" And the amphibious old creature rollicked over the idea with infinite merriment. "Don't I look like it, Miss Fanny? Lord, ye por dear lamb, can't folks see ye's a born lady, with yer white, little hands? Don't ye be 'feared, Miss Fanny!"
"I know it's silly," said Fanny; "but, beside, I don't like to be calledpoor white folksy!"
"Oh, chile, it's only dem mean niggers! Miss Nina's allers good to ye, an't she? Speaks to ye so handsome. Ye must memorize dat ar, Miss Fanny, and talk like Miss Nina. I's feared, now yer ma's dead, ye'll fall into some o' my nigger ways of talking. 'Member you mustn't talk like Old Tiff, 'cause young ladies and gen'lemen mustn't talk like niggers. Now, I says 'dis and dat, dis yer and dat ar.' Dat ar is nigger talk, and por white folksy, too. Only de por white folks, dey's mis'able, 'cause niggersknowswhat's good talk, but dey doesn't. Lord, chile, Old Tiffknowswhat good talk is. An't he heard de greatest ladies and gen'lemen in de land talk? But he don't want de trouble to talk dat ar way, 'cause he's a nigger! Tiff likes his own talk—it's good enough for Tiff. Tiff's talk sarves him mighty well, I tell yer. But, den, white children mustn't talk so. Now, you see, Miss Nina has got de prettiest way of saying her words. Dey drops out one after another, one after another, so pretty! Now, you mind, 'cause she's coming to see us off and on—she promised so. And den you keep a good lookout how she walks, and how she holds her pocket-handkerchief. And when she sits down she kind o' gives a little flirt to her clothes, so dey all set out round her like ruffles. Dese yer little ways ladies have! Why, dese yer por white folks, did yer ever mind der settin' down? Why, dey jist slaps down into a chair like a spoonful o' mush, and der clothes all stick tight about 'em. I don't want nothingpoor white folksy'bout you.Den, if you don't understand what people's a saying to you, any time, you mustn't star, like por white chil'en, and say, 'what?' but you must say 'I beg pardon, sir,' or, 'I beg pardon, ma'am.' Dat ar's de way. And, Miss Fanny, you and Teddy, you must study yer book; 'cause, if you can't read, den dey'll be sure to say yer por white folks. And, den, Miss Fanny, you see dat ladies don't demean demselves with sweeping and scrubbing, and dem tings; and yetdey does work, honey! Dey sews, and dey knits; and it would be good for you to larn how to sew and knit; 'cause, you know, I can't allers make up all de clothes; 'cause, you see, young ladies haves ways wid 'em dat niggers can't get. Now, you see, Miss Fanny, all dese yer tings I was telling you, you must 'bserve. Now, you see, if you was one of dese yer por white folks, dere be no use of your trying; 'cause dat ar 'scription o' people couldn't never be ladies, if dey was waring themselves out a trying. But, you see, you's got it in you; you was born to it, honey. It's in de blood; and what's in de blood must come out—ho! ho! ho!" And with this final laugh, Tiff drew up to his dwelling.
A busy day was before Old Tiff; for he was to set his house in order for a week's campaign. There was his corn to be hoed, his parsley to be weeded, there was his orphan family of young partridges to be cared for. And Tiff, after some considerable consideration, resolved to take them along with him in a basket; thinking, in the intervals of devotion, he should have an abundant opportunity to minister to their wants, and superintend their education. Then he went to one of his favorite springes, and brought from thence, not a fatted calf, to be sure, but a fatted coon, which he intended to take with him, to serve as the basis of a savory stew on the camp-ground. Tiff had a thriving company of pot-herbs, and a flourishing young colony of onions; so that, whatever might be true of the sermons, it was evident that the stew would lack no savor. Teddy's clothes, also, were to be passed in review; washing and ironing to be done; the baby fitted up to do honor to his name, or rather to the name of his grandfather. With all these cares upon his mind, the old creature was even more than usually alert. The day was warm, and he resolved, therefore, to perform his washing operations in the magnificent kitchen of nature. Heaccordingly kindled a splendid bonfire, which was soon crackling at a short distance from the house, slung over it his kettle, and proceeded to some other necessary avocations. The pine-wood, which had been imperfectly seasoned, served him the ungracious trick that pine-wood is apt to do; it crackled and roared merrily while he was present, but while he was down examining his traps in the woods went entirely out, leaving only the blackened sticks.
"Uncle Tiff," said Teddy, "the fire is all gone out!"
"Ho! ho! ho!—Has it?" said Tiff, coming up. "Curus enough! Well, bress de Lord, got all de wood left, any way; had a real bright fire, beside," said Tiff, intent on upholding the sunniest side of things. "Lord, it's de sun dat puts de fire out o' countenance. Did you ever see fire dat wouldn't go out when de sun's shining right in it's face? Dat ar is a curus fact. I's minded it heaps o' times. Well, I'll jist have to come out wid my light-wood kindlings, dat's all. Bress de Lord, ho! ho! ho!" said Tiff, laughing to himself, "if dese yer an't the very sp'rit of de camp-meeting professors! Dey blazes away at de camp-meeting, and den dey's black all de year round! See 'em at de camp-meetings, you'd say dey war gwine right into de kingdom, sure enough! Well, Lord have marcy on us all! Our 'ligion's drefful poor stuff! We don' know but a despert leetle, and what we does know we don' do. De good Mas'r above must have his hands full, with us!"